![\"Stephen](\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/GettyImages-2194146393-e1789154724690.jpg\")
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Stephen Curry #30 of the Golden State Warriors and Anthony Edwards.<\/p>\n
One of the developing stories over the late summer for the Golden State Warriors<\/a> has been, of course, the potential contract extension that could be given to star guard Stephen Curry<\/a>, who is heading into a potential free agency with a $65 million player option for next season. With the team also sitting on expiring deals for Draymond Green<\/a> and Jimmy Butler<\/a>, and owning a team option on center Kristaps Porzingis<\/a>, there is a real chance that the Warriors could find themselves with more than $100 million in cap space, and perhaps even enough money to sign not one, but two max-salary players. <\/p>\n That would be a longshot. But the reality is, there is enough flexibility for the Warriors to to sign a max player and a significant secondary player, while still possibly keeping some combination of Butler, Green and\/or Porzingis, depending on the money and the order of operations. And the max player does not have to be a player-for-player trade\u2013the Warriors could give sap relief to a team with apron concerns.<\/p>\n Warriors Should Monitor Star Market Amid Stephen Curry Talk<\/p>\n Or, better yet, the Warriors could be a destination for a star who finds himself disgruntled. That\u2019s the better outcome for Golden State, and it is a realistic one. But the bigger question usually comes thereafter: It\u2019s nice to have cap space, but which players specifically could it be used on? <\/p>\n On the \u201cWarriors Plus\/Minus<\/a>\u201d podcast with veteran team reporters Tim Kawakami and Marcus Thompson, that question was raised. Nikola Jokic? Devin Booker? Maybe. But the ideal fit might be someone Curry befriended during their time together in the 2024 Olympics: Anthony Edwards of the Timberwolves. <\/p>\n Anthony Edwards Close With Warriors\u2019 Stephen Curry <\/p>\n Thompson raised Edwards as a Warriors possibility\u2013among others, including the Magic<\/a>\u2018s two stars (Franz Wagner<\/a> and Paolo Banchero<\/a>), Jokic and Booker, and Chet Holmgren<\/a> of the Thunder<\/a>. <\/p>\n But Edwards is the one who bears the most watching, because of his relationship with Curry (and coach Steve Kerr, who helmed Team USA in Paris) and because the Timberwolves <\/a>are on shaky ground as a continued contender. <\/p>\n Said Thompson: \u201cI think you have got to anticipate what is possible. I think you are watching Orlando very closely. Do they fall off the wagon here? If it becomes a terrible\u2014because now, you\u2019ve got to start paying more people. \u2026<\/p>\n \u201cI do think they have to be thinking that way. I don\u2019t know how but Minnesota. We know\u2014I was thinking, who does Steph have these relationships with, the young guys? And it\u2019s Ant. And Steve (Kerr) has it, too. If that LaMelo thing doesn\u2019t work out\u2014and, here\u2019s the difficulty, I don\u2019t know why Minnesota would not make sure Anthony Edwards<\/a> stays there. Based on their history, we know they would not be happy if somehow Anthony Edwards ended up with the Warriors. I do think the LaMelo (Ball) situation was like, \u2018All right, we have been trying to crest this hill for some years.\u2019 <\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s a risky move for Tim Connelly. Some of those players, they have just got to be monitoring.\u201d<\/p>\n Timberwolves\u2019 Status Will Weigh on Anthony Edwards<\/p>\n Indeed, Edwards has three years left on his deal which means the Timberwolves are not about to panic about his future. But this is a big year in the wake of the LaMelo Ball<\/a> trade Thompson referenced. If that deal is a flop, the Timberwolves are going to have an increasingly barren future as a contender. <\/p>\n Rudy Gobert<\/a> is now 34 years old, and the Wolves\u2019 pick chamber is nearly bare. They have three first-rounders in the next seven drafts. Charlotte can swap for two of the three (2028 and 2030). It\u2019s possible that Edwards will look around and decide he wants out next summer. If he does, wouldn\u2019t joining Curry make sense for him? <\/p>\n \n\t\t\tSean Deveney<\/a> is a veteran sports reporter covering the NBA, NFL and MLB for Heavy.com. He has written for Heavy since 2019 and has more than two decades of experience covering the NBA, including 17 years as the lead NBA reporter for the Sporting News. Deveney is the author of 7 nonfiction books, including “Fun City,” “Before Wrigley became Wrigley,” and “Facing Michael Jordan.” More about Sean Deveney<\/a>\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Getty Stephen Curry #30 of the Golden State Warriors and Anthony Edwards. One of the developing stories over…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":833721,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3786],"tags":[7,479,164,4025,4024,6,255],"class_list":["post-833720","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-golden-state-warriors","tag-basketball","tag-golden-state","tag-golden-state-warriors","tag-goldenstate","tag-goldenstatewarriors","tag-nba","tag-warriors"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/117257927634492738","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/833720","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=833720"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/833720\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/833721"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=833720"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=833720"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=833720"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}